Osler's Razor

This Easter is going to be different, isn't it?

For many of us, we are away from those we usually spend this holiday with. (For me, the coronavirus will keep me apart from Susan Stabile and her epic leg of lamb, for one thing). For others, there is the fear of illness or the reality of it. Some have lost work in the last few weeks. It is not a normal time.

I can't say when things will get better. I don't know that.

But I know this lesson of Easter and all that Christ brought: that in hard times, we must be good to one another. We must forgive, and heal, and turn away from quests for money or power. We must care for people and about people we usually don't care for or care about. We must be selfless in a way we too rarely are.

In Holy Week, we have people doing good and bad things. Judas sells out his friend and teacher for money. The crowd screams for retribution against Jesus, that he be killed. Peter slices off the ear of Malchus, the slave, and then denies Jesus three times. But, too, there is Mary Magdalene, quietly paying attention. There is the sacrifice of Joseph of Arithimea, who gave up his tomb for Jesus.

For our time, it might be good, too, to remember what happened next.

Jesus appeared to the disciples as they were fishing. They went to shore and he made them breakfast. That is maybe my favorite story in the Bible. And it is what we long for, isn't it? A return to the mundane, to simple love and presence in community. And the story of Jesus tells us that will happen.